Comet Server is accessed via a web interface. From here you can configure access to the Server Web Interface. Please note the addresses in the drop down for the Server Interface. You can also configure SSL from this screen. Use a free, automatically-renewing SSL certificate with the 'Automatic' option that integrates with Let's Encrypt.

You have now setup the basic elements of your Comet Server to run a backup. Press 'finish' and your Comet server will start and the Server Interface will be available at the addresses in the drop-down of step 2.

From the quick actions menu, select "Add User". This allows you to create a new user/customer that can run backups.

During this process, you can choose if you want to be able to reset their password; the default storage vault they will back up to; and if they will be part of a policy group. You can configure these additional options at a later date if you wish.

Once you have installed the Comet Backup client, you can login with the user details you created to setup a backup start by selecting '+ Add Protected Item' from here simply follow the short wizard to create a backup. Upon completing this you can run the backup or leave it to run on schedule if you created one.

That covers the basics of setting up your Comet Enterprise server to run a backup.

Set up a storage vault in the "Account" tab by clicking "+ Add Storage Vault". Now either choose your request-able storage vault you have configured on your Comet server or select Custom if you want to have a unique storage vault for this client. The custom option will allow you to set up local path backups or to have the client send data directly to your cloud storage and more.

Add the items you would like to be backed up. You can exclude a range of files from the backup job. An exclusion filter checks whether to exclude each file from backup, using either a glob pattern or a regular expression (regex). There is no limit to the number of exclusion filters you can add to a single Protected Item.

On Windows, the "Take filesystem snapshot" option creates a VSS snapshot. This enables Comet to backup files that are currently in-use. It also provides disk-wide "crash-consistency", as all files for backup will originate from the precisely same timestamp.

You can register additional commands to run before- or after any backup job. For maximum flexibility, commands can be registered

for a Protected Item (e.g. to dump a database), or
for a Storage Vault (e.g. to perform custom network authentication), or
for a Schedule (e.g. to shut down the computer afterward).
During a backup job, the commands are run in this order: Schedule Before, Protected Item Before, Storage Vault Before, Backup, Storage Vault After, Protected Item After, Schedule After.

Shell built-ins can be used as part of the command execution - the specified command is passed to either cmd.exe or /bin/sh as appropriate for your operating system.

Comet can run backup jobs automatically on a schedule. It is strongly recommended to automate your backups on a regular schedule. When a schedule is due to run, the backup job will run automatically to the selected Storage Vault.

You can configure a retention policy to apply when backing up this Protected Item to a specific Storage Vault. If no policy is configured for a specific Storage Vault, the default retention policy for the Storage Vault will apply.